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Advisor(s)
Abstract(s)
Two developments have marked EU democracies, with different levels of incidence
and intensity, during the past two decades: the decline in support for democracy and the spread
of corruption. Most individual-level analyses have identified the incumbent’s economic performance
or government effectiveness as sufficient explanations of citizens’ growing dissatisfaction
with democracy; whilst corruption has been downplayed as an explanatory variable
by these multifactor analyses. We contend that this has partly to do with conceptual and
methodological failings in the way perceptions about the phenomenon are measured. Defining
corruption as abuse of office is insufficient to understand how perceptions about the decline of
ethical standards in public life can be relevant to shape specific support for democracy. In this
article, we propose an alternative conceptualization that goes beyond what is proscribed in the
penal codes and special criminal laws, which the literature has recently defined as legal/
institutional corruption, and demonstrate how it can offer an interesting explanation of citizens’
perceptions of the way democracy works in a European context (EU-27 member states).
Description
Keywords
Legal Corruption Democracy Institutional corruption Dissatisfaction European Union
Pedagogical Context
Citation
Sousa, L. de, Maciel, G. (2017). Legal Corruption and Dissatisfaction with Democracy in the European Union. Social Indicators Research 140 (2), 653-674.
Publisher
Springer Netherlands